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#:aithiv^.6rti/c[etails/bemardshaw6nmod00shawrich 


ERNARD  SHAW 

ON 

[ODERN  TYPOGRAPHY 


•n. 


BERNARD  SHAW 

ON 

MODERN  TYPOGRAPHY 


REPRINTED  FROM 

THE  CAXTON  MAGAZINE 

LONDON 


HORACE  CARR 
AT  THE  PRINTING  PRESS 
CLEVELAND 
*      1915 


IJOAN  STACK 


iXMN  S1AUC 


MODERN  TYPOGRAPHY 

Like  most  authors,  I  am  so  greatly  itidthv 
ed  to  the  printer,  and  the  printer's  reader, 
for  their  work  and  help  in  the  produAion 
of  my  books,  that  1  cannot  point  out  their 
shortcomings  without  feeUng  some  stings 
of  conscience  for  my  ingratitude.  Besides, 
an  author  is  not  a  fair  judge  of  a  printer, 
because  the  author  himself  usually  spoils 
the  printer's  work. 
This  arises  from  the  fad  that  the  main 
difference  between  a  well^printed  page 
and  an  ill/printed  one  lies  in  the  evenness 
of  the  block  of  colour  presented  by  the  let^ 
terpress.  If  the  justification  is  made  solely 
to  comply  with  some  office  rule  against  du 
viding  words  at  the  end  of  a  line,  or  if  the 
spaces  between  the  sentences  are  made  as 
long  as  possible,  or  if  the  page  is  leaded, 
ana  the  type  kept  small,  so  as  to  make  the 
white  the  chief  feature  instead  of  the  black, 


413 


then  no  ingenuity  of  ornament,  or  gilt  edg/ 
ing,  or  silky  surface  in  one  fashion,  or  a& 
fedation  of  Caslon  type  and  deckle  edged 
hand^made  paper  in  another,  will  make 
the  book  look  well.  Not  only  will  there 
be  the  transverse  bars  of  white  made  by 
the  leads,  but  rivers  of  white  will  trickle 
up  and  down  between  the  words  like  rain^ 
drops  on  a  window  pane;  and  the  block  of 
letterpress  will  be  grey  here  and  whitey^ 
brown  there,  and  mildewy  in  the  other 
place,instead  of  a  rich,even  colour  all  over. 
Now  I  think  it  cannot  be  denied  that 
many  fashionable  books  show  that  the 
printer  has  not  only  not  known  this  first 
canon  of  his  art,  but  that  he  has  actually 
gone  out  of  his  way  to  introduce  leads  and 
spacings  wherever  he  can.  And  even  the 
most  cultivated  authors  encourage  him  in 
this :  for  instance,  Mr.  Ruskin's  books,  as 
printed  under  his  own  supervision,  are 
instructive  examples  of  everything  a  book 
should  not  be.  In  the  books  of  a  great  art/ 
ist/printer  like  William  Morris,  you  will 
find  that  not  only  did  he  discard  leading 
and  make  it  an  invariable  rule  to  set  his 
type  solid,  but  he  often  introduced  little 
leaf  ornaments  between  the  sentences  in 


order  to  fill  up  a  gap  which  would  other/ 
wise  have  made  a  white  patch  by  coming 
immediately  above  or  below  another  such 
space.  And  in  reprinting  his  own  works, 
whenever  he  found  a  line  that  justified 
awkwardly,  he  altered  the  wording  solely 
for  the  sake  of  making  it  look  well  in  print. 

When  a  proof  has  been  sent  me  with 
two  or  three  lines  so  widely  spaced  as  to 
make  a  grey  band  across  the  page,  1  have 
often  re^written  the  passage  so  as  to  fill 
up  the  lines  better;  but  1  am  sorry  to  say 
that  my  objed  has  generally  been  so  little 
understood  that  the  compositor  has  spoilt 
all  the  rest  of  the  paragraph  instead  of 
mending  his  former  bad  work.  Some  of 
the  American  imitators  of  William  Mor^ 
ris  have  actually  introduced  copies  of  his 
leaf  ornaments  between  their  sentences, 
and  then  made  a  wide  space  after  the  orna^ 
ment  as  if  to  prove  how  little  they  under/ 
stood  what  he  used  it  for. 

The  way  in  which  the  author  spoils  the 
printer's  work  is  now  clear.  The  author 
always  makes  his  purely  literary  correct 
tions  on  the  proof  Consequently,  though 
the  printer  take  pains  to  set  his  page  so 
that  it  is  as  even  in  colour  as  a  column  of 


the  Maz;arin  Bible,  the  author  comes  and 
knocks  out  a  word  here  and  wedges  in  a 
sentence  there;  so  that  the  printer  finds 
all  his  trouble  wasted  and  his  work  dis^ 
figured.  Under  such  circumstances  he  nat^ 
urally  grows  accustomed  to  disregard  the 
beautiful  evenness  of  his  page,  and  to  jus^ 
tify  in  the  cheapest,  shortest  and  handiest 
way.  It  is  therefore  only  in  the  reprint^ 
ing  of  the  classic  authors,  where  nothing 
but  literals  are  corrected,  that  the  printer 
can  fairly  be  expected  to  produce  work  of 
mediaeval  or  Morrisian  excellence.  And 
even  in  such  editions  we  very  rarely  get  it, 
because  compositors  shift  from  one  job  to 
another,  anci  lose  their  conscientiousness 
on  this  point.  A  good  artist  ^'compositor 
should  never  be  allowed  to  touch  the  work 
of  a  living  author. 

Next  to  evenness  and  richness  of  colour 
in  the  block  of  letterpress,  the  most  im^ 
portant  point  in  a  printed  page  is  margin^ 
ing.  And  here  the  printer  is  very  apt  to 
go  wrong.  Every  printer  can  understand 
regularity:  few  have  studied  good  looks 
except  in  living  creatures.  Consequently 
they  aim  at  equal  margins ;  and  even  when 
they  have  learnt  that  an  upper  margin 


must  be  less  than  a  lower  one  if  it  is  not 
to  look  more,  they  do  not  always  see  that 
it  looks  well  only  when  it  looks  less.  The 
mediaeval  manuscript  or  early  printed 
book,  with  its  very  narrow  margin  at  the 
top  and  very  broad  margin  at  the  bottom 
of  the  page,  with  its  outer  margins  broad 
and  its  inner  ones  contraded,  so  that  when 
the  book  lies  open  the  two  pages  seem  to 
make  but  a  single  block  of  letterpress  in 
a  single  frame,  instead  of  two  side  by  side, 
has  never  been  improved  upon  and  prob/ 
ably  never  will  be.  But  1  find  it  almost  im/ 
possible  to  persuade  a  modern  printer  to 
make  his  top  margin  small  enough;  and 
when  1  at  last  succeed,  he  measures  it  from 
the  running  title  instead  of  from  the  top 
line  of  the  page.  I  saw  a  book  the  other 
day,  excellently  printed  in  old^faced  type, 
set  solid,  on  a  fine  light,  clean  white  crusty 
paper;  yet  the  page  was  quite  spoiled  by 
an  exaggerated  top  margin,like  a  masher's 
collar,  and  by  that  abomination  of  deso^ 
lation,  a  rule.  The  only  thing  that  never 
looks  right  is  a  rule.  There  is  not  in  txis^ 
tence  a  page  with  a  rule  on  it  that  cannot 
be  instantly  and  obviously  improved  by 
taking  the  rule  out.  Even  dashes,  cher^ 


ished  as  they  are  by  authors  who  cannot 
pundhiate,  spoil  a  page.  They  are  general^ 
ly  merely  ignorant  substitutes  for  colons. 
Of  course,  printers  who  want  to  turn 
out  fine  work  have  constantly  to  face  the 
diflGiculty  that  the  average  customer,  un^ 
fortunately  including  the  average  author, 
dislikes  it.  It  is  quite  a  mistake  to  think 
that  he  is  merely  insensible  to  the  beauty 
of  a  finely/designed  and  well^printed  page: 
he  positively  hates  it.  He  likes  as  much 
glossy  white  paper  and  as  little  black  as 
possible.  He  likes  regularity.  When  he 
hangs  up  a  print  in  his  drawing-^room,  he 
has  it  framed  with  several  inches  of  white 
mount  all  around  it.  He  provides  his  own 

Eerson  with  white  margin  in  the  shape  of 
uge  collar  and  cuflFs,  starched  and  ironed. 
Naturally,  he  likes  leads  in  his  books  and 
broad  and  equal  margins.  He  likes  rules 
because  they  are  straight.  He  even  tells 
you  that  solid  set  type  hurts  the  tyts^  and 
accuses  you  of  paradox  when  you  tell  him 
that  it  is  the  glare  of  the  leaded  space  and 
the  smallness  of  the  leaded  type  that  really 
make  work  for  the  oculist.  He  will  buy  a 
so/called  art  book,  printed  on  paper  that 
will  turn  into  mud  if  a  drop  of  water  falls 

8 


on  it,  and  send  it  to  Mr.  Douglas  Cockerell 
or  Mr.  Cobden  Sanderson  to  be  bound  as 
if  it  were  a  treasure  for  which  national  lu 
braries  might  compete ;  and  if  you  oflFered 
him  his  choice  of  a  Kelmscott  Press  book 
and  a  Leadenhall  Press  one,  he  would  re^ 
jed  William  Morris  and  accept  Andrew 
Tuer,  whose  taste  he  w^ould  honestly  be^ 
lieve  superior  to  Jenson's. 

Every  first/ rate  printing  house  should 
have  a  masterpiece  of  plain  printing:  not 
necessarily  a  rare  book,  but  a  well/printed 
one.  With  this  should  be  kept  a  thorough^ 
ly  vile  specimen  of  a  modern  fashionable 
art  book.  Every  author  should  be  shown 
these  two,  and  asked  which  he  prefers.  If 
he  chooses  the  bad  one,  the  printer  should 
thereupon  tell  him  that  the  book  he  dis/ 
likes  is  worth  as  many  pounds  as  the  other 
is  worth  sixpences,  and  this  will  so  put 
him  out  of  countenance  that  he  will  not 
presume  to  give  any  instructions  or  med^ 
die  in  the  printing  of  his  own  work.  If  he 
chooses  rightly,  the  printer  may  safely  hail 
him  as  worthy  to  be  consulted  in  the  im^ 
portant  matter  of  making  a  book. 

For—  and  this  is  the  moral  of  what  I  have 
been  saying— well/printed  books  are  just 


as  scarce  as  well^written  ones;  and  every 
author  should  remember  that  the  most 
costly  books  in  the  world  derive  their 
value  from  the  craft  of  the  printer,  and  not 
from  the  genius  of  the  author.  1  have  seen 
a  bestiary,  or  mediaeval  natural  history, 
the  worthless  compilation  of  a  childish 
liar,  purchased  for  £800  in  a  city  where 
the  works  of  Shakespeare  sell  for  tenpence 
halfpenny.  And  if  you  want  to  buy  a 
Shakespeare  for  £60,  you  must  bid  for 
one  of  the  volumes  of  his  sonnets  which 
Morris  printed  at  the  Kelmscott  Press. 


10 


J  fw.Rw  aw  w^in^  R^^^  Rw  aw  nMM  wi  9kmm  mi  n^im  & 


E  JUDGE  OURSELVES 
BY  WHAT  WE  FEEL 
CAPABLE  OF  DOING, 
BUT  OTHERS  JUDGE 
US  BY  WHAT  WE  HAVE  AL. 
-2  READY  DONE.  •:•  LCmCFELLOlV 


Q  lAi  mi  mi  im  in«  im  miiAf  in«  in«  immi  im  mi  w^  vWim  ^ 


Among  the  specimens  received  during  the 
past  month,  a  package  from  Horace  Carr, 
Cleveland,  easily  takes  precedence.  Excels 
lent  stock,  largely  hanci/made,  good  inks, 
good  presswork  and  an  unusually  careful 
regard  for  type  arrangement  and  color,  all 
combine  to  make  this  work  a  delight  to  the 
lover  of  the  best  in  printing.  There  is  noth^ 
ing  to  critici2,e  in  any  of  it.— Inland  Printer. 

Mr.  Carr  is  one  of  the  best  typographers  in 
the  United  States.  He  knows  type  faces, 
and  when  he  uses  decoration  it  is  the  kind 
that  blends  with  the  spirit  of  the  printed 
page.  When  he  seleds  inks  and  papers, 
they  seem  to  be  the  only  kind  that  could 
have  been  seleded.— American  Printer. 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 

Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 

■i^GW^A 

M    9'fi4-/]Ai.                           1 

ri 

MARi-^  b**  i^rw 

FEB  23  1970 

a§C^O  LD   . 

f/ln  7  r   '-7^ 

■                  r 

'^■*» 

} 

(E1602slO)4/6B                                             Berkeley 

.C.  BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 

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